Rapid prototyping involves a process of depositing material in layers to build three-dimensional objects. In the case of jewelry manufacturing, the deposited material may be wax and the rapid prototyping process may be used to build wax models. The wax models may be used in a lost wax process to create a metal piece of jewelry such as a ring, for example. The use of rapid prototyping to create wax models for jewelry is described in a series of U.S. Patent Applications entitled “Method for Digital Manufacturing of Jewelry Items” with the following application serial numbers and filing dates: 61/308,245 filed on Feb. 25, 2010; Ser. No. 13/035,742 filed on Feb. 25, 2011; and 61/694,546 filed on Aug. 29, 2012. These applications are hereby incorporated by reference herein in their entireties.
The rapid prototyping process relies on a computer model that a rapid prototyping machine may transform into a physical wax model by growing it (i.e., printing it on a substrate in a series of layers). The creation of the computer model, or portions thereof, may be performed in several ways, but other approaches are needed.